Want People To Care? Make Some Noise About Your PTO

PTOs and PTAs do so much each school year, from the mundane, like making copies of worksheets for teachers, to the unforgettable, like funding a playground. It all makes a difference, but parents often don’t know about these accomplishments.

PTO leaders aren’t always comfortable publicizing these basic facts for fear they will be seen as show-offs. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. If you want parents to support your group, both in dollars and in manpower, doesn’t it make sense to tell them what they’re buying into?

Try these four ideas to get the word out:

1. Publish your list of accomplishments. If you haven’t put together your final newsletter or written your last Facebook post of the year, consider adding a list of what your group did this year. Or, if you’ve wrapped up already, try sending a note to families this summer to encourage involvement and include this list.

2. Say it with pictures. If you aren’t keen on lists, gather up photos from this year’s events and create photo albums to post on Facebook and on your website. Post them during the summer, with a comment that explains how the PTO supported the event.

3. Be creative. We’ve seen groups toot their own horn in clever ways. One of our favorites came from McKenny Elementary PTO in Olympia, Wash. It created a colorful tree graphic to display the enrichment and academic programs it supports. You can find an image of this tree on our File Exchange to download and customize for your group.

4. Let others inspire you. On Pinterest, we found a PTA that pinned its list of accomplishments with a bit of humor, using this headline: “PTA does that?” Yep, it can be shocking to see everything a group can do! We added additional examples to our PTO Group Management board on Pinterest that you may find helpful.

Check out these additional resources for getting the word out about your group:

Free Guide: Marketing Must-Dos for PTOs and PTAs
Basic Marketing that Builds Involvement
How To Celebrate and Promote Your Group (National School Parent Group Day materials, useful year-round)